Dear Reader,
I am so proud of Word Raccoon.
And of myself, too, for that matter.
This is what I would call a non-literature win.
WR has asked me to please stop blathering on about Project House Gorgeous, but today’s accomplishment deserves a mention.
For the entire time we’ve lived in this house, WR and I have despised the dining room ceiling tiles.
But everything (and everyone) came first.
No more.
A couple of days ago we ordered a box of decorative ceiling tiles. Polyvinyl. 3D. Drop-in. (We have a grid ceiling.)
Had we ever installed ceiling tiles before?
Nope.
Did WR and I think we could do it?
Also nope.
Growing up, I helped my dad with various projects. Ceiling tile was on the list. Drywall, too. (As well as insulation. The itchy kind. Torment.) Mostly, though, my role was “hold this” and “hand me that.” I wasn’t especially interested, so I assumed I hadn’t learned much.
Or maybe I had.
Me, this morning:
“WR, don’t worry. I just want to try one tile to see if I can do it. Then we’ll shower and head to the café to work on poetry.”
Three hours later…
Here’s what happened.
We found the tall ladder in the garage.
Brought it into the dining room.
Wondered whether it was too tall.
Wondered whether it was somehow not tall enough.
Moved furniture.
Put on safety glasses, a mask, and a hat. Promptly abandoned the hat. Then I had to choose between the glasses and the mask because the glasses kept fogging up.
Great shades of the pandemic.
The mask won. The dust was making WR cough.
Then came the surprise.
Our drop ceiling had barely been dropped at all. Just a couple of inches. Wrestling the old tiles out was…creative. Several cracked apart and bounced off my head on the way down.
Thankfully, they weren’t very heavy.
Once the old tiles were out, the new ones slipped in much more easily.
Notice I said more easily.
Not easily.
Remember, I have some physical limitations, but I pulled myself up that ladder anyway.
The box contained twelve tiles.
My original goal? Drop in one.
One.
Then it became two.
Then maybe three or four.
Then six.
I made it to seven before my left arm started blinking red. It was shaking and informed me that it didn’t particularly care how much arthritis medicine I’d taken. It had filed a formal complaint and was clocking out.
So, much to WR’s horror, we stopped in the middle of the project. But I did take her on a burger run.
We really should wait until the whole room is finished before showing you, but honestly?
We can’t. We LURVE these. WR says that as far as she is concerned, these are ceiling poems.
(My back is now suggesting that perhaps Thursday is a perfectly respectable day to finish the remaining five, since I have obligations keeping me busy before then anyway. WR, meanwhile, has already ordered the second box.)
And now…
WR is looking at the kitchen ceiling.
That wee beastie is impossible.
But she might be onto something. Better she do something constructive than to moon over…the heat.
Drema